First the B-29 bomber got hit by anti-aircraft guns and lost one of its four engines. Then it ran out of gas at night over the Indian Ocean during a rainstorm. When the plane crashed into 8- to 10-foot waves, it felt as if it were “running up against a solid wall,” Elwin Hudson said.

Hudson, a 95-year-old Round Rock resident and World War II Army Air Forces pilot, still has a photo of the two rafts that he and eight crew members use to escape on Aug. 10, 1944. He showed it during a recent interview at the independent living facility where he lives.

For years he avoided talking about the crash or his World War II service, he said, despite receiving several medals, including the Purple Heart and the Distinguished Flying Cross. “My daddy always told me, ‘Don’t toot your own horn,’ and I always kind of followed that,” he said.